The Brighter Days
by Ancestral Romance
Summary: Four years ago, the princess of Renais went missing. At the same time, the beginnings of the war with Grado being to show. Ephriam thought his sister was missing, dead even, until he stared her straight in the face. He's stunned- "Is that you?" and overjoyed, until he finds out she doesn't know who he is... "No, I do not know you." Very quickly, for the second time, Ephraim broke.
1. Prologue

**(A/N) So this is my first fanfiction. I decided to make it for a game I really loved as a child, and still do. Significant changes are noted within, and explained- besides the ages of the characters. The war of the stones starts earlier than in the actually game (or rather, the beginning signs of the war). **

**Enjoy. ~ Ancestral Romance**

Prologue

It started out as a sunny day. That much she could remember. She thought back to the days- most of them seemed sunny to her as a child. She didn't have many cares back then either. Her biggest worry was when Lyon and Ephriam went off somewhere without her. Yes, now, she'd give anything to have something like that be what bothered her most. There was a particular incident in which she remembered most clearly- a sunny (of course) day when she beat Lyon in a sword duel and Ephriam took him away for the rest of the few hours they could've spent together. She wasn't too happy when they came back and Lyon apologized.

She reminisced on the memory. She couldn't have been more than seven at the time, thinking that the both of them were always out to get her when together. She would've laughed at her childishness if she could delve into her mind further. She wanted to think of more of the old, happy days, but a grotesque bellow shook her from her hypnopompic state.

"Eirika…." A gnarly voice called out to her.

She gave a turn a rolled out of the way before a bonewalker took a slice at her. She swung her rapier straight through the center of the monster. It did not rise again. Thankful, she turned her back to the now pile of bones and leather skin, ready to slice through another. In times of war, it was best one didn't get to think too much whilst on the battlefield: it could lead to an injury that would've been easily avoided. She'd already noted before, that in times of war, it was better to look to the future and not the past. She couldn't afford to make it into a habit. She looked grimly at the amount of monsters she still had to fight. It was only she. No one else was here to help her. When had things become so bad? She couldn't recall the last time she'd had a moment's rest. She was always on the run. She breathed heavily. There was too many this time- she was too unprepared. The clusters of monsters had had less and less time in between their ambushes. General Seth hadn't taught her how to master the use of her rapier to be more efficient during these raids. He'd only given her lessons at her pace, which she found had slowed to a stop a few years back. Her inability made her inefficient, especially when one on many, like she was now.

She never had time to even cleanse her wounds before the next attack. She was tired. She dodged a spear aimed her head. Her movements were lagging behind the speed of what they normally were. She couldn't maneuver around the next arrow that flew at her. It stuck her through the left side of her chest. She choked. She sputtered out blood and looked up at the incoming monsters. Her vision began to fade. In the black spots, she saw the claw of a revenant swipe at her temple. She would never know if it made contact or not.

Lady Eirika of Renais, the fourteen-year-old princess, knew no more.

* * *

Erik woke with a sweat. She'd had this reoccurring dream for as long as she could remember. She never could recall the beginning of the dream, just a fog until a name 'Eirika' is drawled across the air in a scratchy voice. From one of her first memories, this was the best thing she came close to, to figuring out who she was. She thought it was just a dream, nothing more. It was where she came up the name of 'Erik' though. If the dream really did have any connection with her past life, before the darkness, she wanted nothing to do with it. Hence why she had taken an abridged version of the name in her dream.

Currently, she has been making her living on a ship with a bunch of pirates and bandits. She couldn't say that the life was an easy one, but it was the only one she's ever known. From the first moment she could remember, she'd lived on the ship. Of course, she knew she wasn't originally with all these burly men, from what the captain told her, they found her floating in the water, like a dead man. They'd pulled her up on the deck and made-do with the medical equipment they had on board. Apparently, her injuries were pretty extensive, she 'should have been dead,' they said. She knew nothing of the abrasions on her body, just scars littering her body. When she did her best to remember, the dream was the only thing she could think of, so she told them to call her Erik. And they did.

The captain was as kind as a man could be for his line of "work". He'd been kind enough to allow her to stay on board, leech meals from him and protect her. She'd asked to stay with him, when they had reached land after a few weeks travel. After he bargained with her to stay for her to work, she relented. She learned the backbreaking work, she began to wield heavy axes, and Erik was forced to do work she had a feeling she would have never done in her previous life. None-the-less, she came to love the life abroad the ship, fighting monsters that appeared on the sea, even helping with the crew to "collect debts" for the captain. Of course, she knew that the "debt collecting" they did wasn't entirely legitimate, but neither were the people whom she collected from. With the gold they collected (or items, in some cases) the captain would take them to some impoverished or barren town and clean out their ale cellars and clean out their shops of needed items. Eventually, it could help the town out. In a twisted way, it was justice, and Erik saw and venerated him for that.

It's been four years since she first became a part of the crew, and now, a steady member, she'd been minimally involved in the bigger of the dealings of all these men. Yes, some were shady figures, but for the most part, they were good men. She could attest to that. However, she didn't really know what the world she was dealing with was like. She never knew that both the metaphorical and physical ships she was on were sinking. Not until today- not until she met the man with the lance at the captain's throat.

The rest of the crew was severely injured. One of the oldest members, one she'd hardly spoke with, lay on the ground, blood leaking from his skull. She processed all this in the small amount of time it took her to scan the room, identify the odd men out and prepare to attack.

There was one problem: the blue haired man who was pointing the steel spear into the captain's neck dropped his weapon upon seeing her. His face was full of disbelief. She couldn't say that the slack-jawed look suited this man in expensive amour- nor did it suit the rest of the men and few women he had with him. Erik held her axe, ready to attack the first person that came near her. She steeled herself for a blow she was ready to receive upon entering the Captain's cabin. Nothing came.

"Is that you?" Erik just narrowed her eyes. 'you' could be anyone. She didn't think she wanted to be the 'you' he thought she was.

"No, I do not know you. Do you have a purpose, man? Or are ye just here to harass some sailors?" She spoke. And the man dropped his weapon and he looked like his eyes were welling up. Some of the men he had with him looked the same. She had no clue what was going on. She bared her teeth and looked over to her captain.

**(A/N) A short prologue leading to future chapters, Eirika is in a new life with no recollection of her past. How will the man and his troops react with this meeting? An inspiring song for the prologue is ****Starting a New Life**** by Van Morrison. Leaving me a few reviews will help for better chapters. Constructive criticism is appreciated.**

**~ Ancestral Romance**


	2. Chapter 1

**(A/N) Wow. I'm amazed at all of reviews I got for JUST the first chapter! It was fantastic and really supportive of you all! I must say, I really thought that I'd have more reviews of criticism. The few I got were really polite in how they told me, and didn't discourage me at all. And in total, every review I got was amazing. Seeing reviews that flooded my email made me smile. Oh! I also added in a little I was asked about, like the similarities in Eirika's name and a small bit on her looks. I will elaborate more! ... Thanks guys for making my day brighter! All of the reviews made me write this faster than I initially planned too! … On second thought, it's been a while since I posted the prologue, huh? Oh well. No time like the present!**

**Enjoy. ~ Ancestral Romance**

It wasn't a routine checkup this morning. Prince Ephraim and his men were at the water port South of Renais, after reports to the king about monsters starting to roam on the ships. Reports of such things came in all of the time; monsters running around in the forests, occasional attacks on a village now and then. Normal civilians could and would be able to handle these attacks with ease: they normally saw a singular monster of sorts attack once or twice a year. The palace would ignore the reports of such small incidents, seeing as the men of villages could kill one monster by themselves. But, after an influx of reports from a port city about rampant monsters, the prince was sent to investigate with some of his few chosen soldiers. The men went house-to-house, gathering their network of information.

It seemed that the attacks weren't as frequent as the reports, but there were rumours of a ship the villagers dubbed the "Phantom Ship," and most thought it was in the docks today. The prince and his men were forced to check out all of the boats in the harbor. None of them had seemed suspicious at the time- not that it meant that the villagers were automatically safe.

Ephraim had his men check the ships one by one with himself; they had found a few pirate ships and briskly escorted the barbaric men to a holding area they had set up previous to starting the search. Most of the men hadn't put up a fight against the knights he brought, and the prince figured that he wasn't going to get that much trouble from any of the men.

They had finished with the ships that were already docked, and there was no real evidence that any of the ships had anything linking them to the monster attacks. Ephraim had decided to wait for more ships to pull in, he'd also wanted to stay a week in the port, to continue searching for this ship.

* * *

The day passed on with much ado about nothing. The few men they'd caught had hardly been pirates, just men who'd committed petty crimes. There was nothing of any real sustenance that the prince and his men found. The men were beginning to become restless as the day wore on. Their pacing and restlessness was starting to grate on his nerves- not that he'd act irritated at the men, they were not at fault for their boredom.

Finally, into the evening when ships would stop coming into the docks, another ship anchored at an unoccupied dock. Savvy looking men were scurrying about the deck, preparing to keep their ship anchored and ready to be uninhabited for a day or two. The prince sighed. One of his knights, Forde, grinned.

"About time we got some action. The pause between this ship and the last one was long enough for a nap!" Forde said this without any real enthusiasm. Ephraim shook his head at him and Kyle, another knight, swatted him on his head. Thus began arguing between the two knights. Normally, the prince would have let the two go at it (as it entertained him), but they had a job to do, and they weren't doing it by standing around and arguing with each other.

"If I may, we have a job to do. The two of you can hold your tongues until _after _we search this new ship." He didn't mean to add an edge to his voice, but sometimes, the two needed a good shove to stop their unstopping bickering. If he was any other man, he'd of thought that the two of them hated each other. In actuality, they were probably closer than most people could be. Now was no time to be pondering about this, he mounted a stable horse and lead his men to the ship.

When he got there, Ephraim told the men to bring him and his men to their captain. They'd complied, not that he didn't think they would, but they were acting real sketchy around him, almost nervous. Maybe they had something to hide- most people did. It wouldn't be a surprise if they were hiding a stolen object or some other petty crime. The captain wasn't a terrifying man, like most would think of a pirate, but he didn't look too friendly either. What really struck Ephraim odd about him, was how the man had looked him dead in the face; his face wasn't contorted with fear like some of the other men's faces.

"What can I do fer ye, yer highness?" Ephraim blinked in surprise. Not many people would know right off the bat that it was royalty, and not the local lord, who would have a warrant to search their ship. He put on his friendliest face- these men DID have axes, afterall.

"I have a warrant to search your ship. We are searching for leads about a 'Phantom Ship,' and should not take long to scour your ship. If you comply peacefully, that is." The captain frowned and the rest of his crew became tense. They gripped their axes respectfully, some between their shoulders, some at their sides. Ephraim's men prepared themselves for any sort of attack. This situation was escalating at an alarming rate, at this point, someone would attack another, unprovoked. "Listen. This will only take ten minutes, a half-hour at the most. Then we will be on our way and off of your ship. If we find no habiliments or items of the monsters, we will leave briskly and you won't have to deal with us." Ephraim was on edge. His men weren't doing so hot either. An older crewmember struck out at Kyle and Forde immediately leapt to his aid. He stabbed the man.

That was probably the worst thing Forde could have done. Now the rest of the crew were openly wielding their axes and moving to attack. This was not good. He needed a buffer, and fast.

Almost as if providence heard him, a young crewmember burst through the door, axe ready to take off someone's head. Ephraim kept his spear at the captain's throat. He looked at the young man who held up his axe threateningly. Ephraim stared at the young boy, eyes widening. He looked so similar to- but he couldn't have been. Ephraim just gawked at him, as if time itself had just stopped and he had no control over it. The boy's light blue hair that poked out of his worn bandana looked so much like the shade of his late sister. That wasn't what really made Ephraim pause, no, it was the boy's eyes. The piercing pools bore a striking resemblance to his dead sister's.

Ephraim felt a pang in his heart. Without consciously meaning to, his thoughts slipped out of his head and rolled off of his tongue. "Is that you?" He hadn't even meant to say it. It was as if his body just wanted to say it- it'd been years since he'd seen his sister, and this boy bore a resemblance that just seemed to click in his mind. A small peek around at the men (and women) he brought with him, Ephraim knew he was not alone in his thoughts.

Ephraim knew that his thoughts were irrational, his sister was dead. These thoughts shouldn't have been allowed to run through his head, but they still did. Ephraim normally would've thought he would be shaming his deceased sister by thinking, then saying such a thing, but he could not control his lips and tongue, they seemingly moved by themselves. His rational side was taken over by his yearning of his late sister. The similarities caused an emotional wave that Ephraim was not able to handle and overcome. He looked uneasily at the pirate with his axe still poised in the air, his anticipation building a nauseous feeling in his stomach.

"No, I do not know you. Do you have a purpose, man? Or are ye just here to harass some sailors?" Ephraim froze. The boy's voice sounded nothing like Eirika's: colder, sharp like a blade forged by only the best. The reality of the situation hit Ephraim like a javelin during a joust. He dropped his spear from the captain's neck. He was supposed to be looking for a lead on a 'Phantom Ship,' not chasing after dead siblings, and likening the face of some cabin boy to his deceased sister's. The young pirate narrowed his eyes at Ephraim and waited for him to say something he could potentially take his head off for, at least, that was Ephraim assumed.

Ephraim shook his head to clear it. He wanted to apologize; to the captain, the crew and the young cabin boy. Clearly, his head was not in the right state of mind. "I apologize. There seems to be a misunderstanding. We are only here to search your ship for leads on another ship we are looking for," Ephraim looked back at the captain and continued to speak. "You already know that this is the only thing that we are here for, captain. We came here with no intent on harming or harassing your any of your crew. I will personally buy any resources you need to fix any damage my men have caused your ship. I had no intent of bothering any of your men. Now, I ask you, may we search your ship?" The room was still silent, despite the heavy breathing of all the men and women. The captain looked wearily to the prince, waiting for any signs of false intentions. Ephraim knew he'd dug himself into a hole with his idiotic display of weaponry and his choice of words. Why did he say that? Of all of the ideas and thoughts that ran through his head at that moment, his brain chose thinking of _her_ over any real situation-diffusers. He waited for the captain to reconsider what he said, after witnessing the effects of what he and his men could do.

The captain sighed and got off of his knees. Ephraim waited with baited breath for the captain's response. His crew adjusted their weapons as they themselves waited for a revise of his answer. The captain looked Ephraim directly in his eyes and steeled himself for any harsh looks. There were none, just blue eyes of a prince that held a hint of regret and another unreadable expression.

After a moment of silence, the captain was ready to negotiate with the prince, if only to save more men from death or harm.

Only minutes had passed when Ephraim and the captain had reached an agreement. Ephraim would pay for anything he or his crew destroyed, he would also replace anything he couldn't just pay for. His soldiers would yield their weapons while in the presence of any of the crew members during their time in the ship. In return, Ephraim and his men would be able to search the ship for the monsters they'd been tipped about.

* * *

After their search turned up nothing, Ephraim thanked the captain for allowing them to search, and he apologized again. He and his men left the ship, ready to turn in for the night. They'd search any new boats in the morning. One last look over his shoulder, Ephraim looked straight into the eyes of the young crew member who sneered at him and his men. It was the same young man who looked eerily like his deceased sister. He breathed out and continued to get off of the ship.

* * *

His men were well rested by the next morning, having cleaned and bandaged any injuries they sustained during their 'misunderstanding' with the pirates. No new ships had arrived during the night, so Ephraim permitted them to occupy themselves around the town while they waited for more ships.

Just because Ephraim gave them all permission to browse the shops and loiter around the town, didn't mean that they all decided to do such. In fact, a few still followed him around, to the point they were getting on his nerves, or rather, Kyle and Forde were. He did like them, a lot actually, but their arguing was driving him mad. In less than an hour of the first time he gave permission to browse around the town, he ordered Kyle and Forde to watch the docks for new arrivals themselves. That left him by himself and without a headache. This alone time was much needed; he needed time to think and plan what to say to his father if he turned up with injuries and empty handed.

An hour passed as Ephraim wandered around the bustling port town, thinking. He didn't notice the subtle shadow following him the majority of the time he'd been walking around. He was too absorbed in his own thoughts, barely missing walking into other people he passed on the crummy streets. Noticing his offbeat behavior, he turned into an alley that was less crowded, and followed its end as a short cut to get back to the tavern he was staying at. Before he reached the end, hands grabbed his shoulders and slammed him into a brick wall.

Harsh blue eyes stared into another set of blue eyes. It was the same crew member that sneered at him and his men. The same man he'd, for a moment, mistaken as his late sister. How one could mistake a man for a woman, Ephraim pondered such a laughable thought. If the young crew boy knew that was what he thought, he would've done more than sneer at him.

Ephraim stared at the face of the man who was currently pinning him against the brick wall. The closer he looked and examined this man; he realized his mistake of how he could've ever thought this rugged looking lad could've been confused with a cute girl like his twin. Maybe because of the date his sister disappeared was coming up; he was starting to see her in everything he saw- adding her attributes to anyone who looked remotely similar to her. Looking at more than his eyes, Ephraim noticed a hideous, long scar that ran down the boy's temple and down most of his cheek. It most likely was never looked at by a healer- magic users who use staves to heal tend to heal the majority of a wound and hardly leave scars. Not that scars mattered to a man- they weren't like losing a limb.

An odd silence passed between the two men as Ephraim's gaze raked down the boy's face, examining his facial features. In the moment it had taken to think and examine the boy, the boy was doing the same to him.

"Do I look like who ye thought I was?" Ephraim's train of thought broke, and then he remembered that the boy had tugged him to the side of an alley with intentions that were probably not of the best sort. He narrowed his eyes, becoming lucid for the first time since he'd split from Kyle and Forde.

"No. You do not. I apologize for my behavior, mistaking you for someone long since gone. I also apologize for the treatment of your crew mates by my men and I. We have already given money for reparations for destroying some items of value to your captain." The boy just shot him a semi-amused look, clearly enjoying the way he apologized. The look the boy was giving him was actually making the young prince more uncomfortable than the sneer he had received last night. "Why have you pulled me aside? If you wanted to speak to me, there are more… conventional means of getting my attention." With this being said, Ephraim hoped the boy would remove his hands from his shoulders and back off a foot or two to give him some space.

"I did want yer attention. I think the ship yer lookin' fer is pullin' inta the docks tomorrow- we passed the ship about two days ago. Some monsters boarded our ship an' we killed 'em. There were a pretty many- too many to have been a normal ship." The boy's accent and speech pattern were easier to understand than most men who lived on ships- not that this fact really said anything, his accent was still pretty strong and hard to understand. He was lucky that he could understand what he said. He'd warn his boys to prepare when they all met back up at the tavern they were staying at. Regardless, he would still be cautious about this information- this boy was glaring at him the night before for the fight that happened between Ephraim's crew and the boy's mates.

"How can I trust you? How do I know that you aren't lying to me, and trying to make me throw my men at some unsuspecting crew? What reassurance do you have that you aren't lying?" Ephraim knew he was pushing the bar by pressing the man for information. After all, the boy was the one with the clear advantage here. The boy looked like he was thinking it over before he decided to speak again.

"You can't trust me, you do not know me. I have nothing to give ye, but me word. What would I gain from making you kill members of a different crew? They don't deserve it. I don't want what ye and yer men did to my people to anyone else- especially those who be unsuspectin' of royal pigs tryin' ta hurt more innocent people." Wise answer, for someone who probably wasn't that wise. Ephraim searched the boy's face for any hints of a fib. He found none, and finally, nodded at the boy. He accepted that maybe the boy genuinely didn't want his crew to hurt anyone else, especially those who didn't deserve it (like today's crew). The boy released his shoulders and stop pressing him up against the cold wall. He started walking away, as if he didn't just seem like he was threatening the prince of Renais.

Ephraim furrowed his eyebrows before doing a small jog to catch up with the boy walking away. "Hey. Wait. Tell me your name; I want to know the name of the boy that assisted us find the ship we've been looking for." For a second of dead, uncomfortable silence, the boy seemed to not want to tell him. Ephraim pursed his lips and waited- the boy must not meet many strangers, to not give out his name so easily. After another moment, the boy finally turned to him and frowned lightly.

"My name is Erik." Time stopped for a moment for Ephraim- a name so similar to his dead sister's. Maybe with the date being so close to the date when he lost his sister, his mind was being overly imaginative and connecting everything about this boy to his deceased sister. His mind went onto auto pilot.

"Erik? That's not a very common name amongst sailors. How'd you get that name?" He didn't know what possessed him to ask, but he would be surely happier later that night when he thought about the boy's reply.

"The captain named me after his dead kid, who was the son of a migrant from Renais. He found me with a pretty nice wound on me head- and decided I was lucky enough to get the name his most treasured thing- his son." How interesting. The amount of similarities between Erik and his sister were striking, but the boy-Erik- was oh so different. Ephraim frowned. There was no use in beating a dead horse- his sister would never come back, and comparing her to common people would do her no good.

He thanked Erik, and headed back to the cheap tavern he and his men were to meet up.

There'd only been one new ship, and Forde and Kyle managed to search the ship without any difficulties. They found nothing.

Ephraim took a generous swig of the ale some barmaid had given him. He proceeded to talk to his men about frivolous things until he decided to turn his full attention to the ship that would be arriving tomorrow. He left out Erik's name, and was glad his men did not press him for the name of the anonymous man who told him this.

Tomorrow, they'd be waiting. Then they could go home and be more constructive with their time. Tomorrow, Ephraim thinks, tomorrow will be the end of a bad week, and the beginning to new week.

**(A/N) So this took a lot longer to just write and give to you guys! I'm sorry about that. It's mostly because I'm lazy, so sorry about that! Anyways, I put a little in about Erik/Eirika's name because a reviewer asked me about it (in all honesty, I didn't even think about it being so stupidly unplanned like that, so thank you). I promise I will describe Eirika's appearance more next chapter. A song for the chapter is A World Without by Queensryche. I highly suggest listening to this song. :)**

**Until next time,**

**-Ancestral Romance**


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